I am not sure if this is the right spot for this questions but I was wondering what everyone's thoughts were on this. Does doing things early mean children are more advanced? Or does it just mean they are doing them early?

It CAN (though not meeting them early does not rule it out, and some kids meet some quite early and then do not go on to be gifted, though I personally think this is not all that common). But you'd need to be more specific for us to say much, and of course we'd be speculating anyway. (What milestones? How early? Is the child being heavily taught or instructed?)

Keep in mind that milestones may be in the format of "if your kid hasn't ______ by _____ age, you should start to worry," in which case most kids are going to meet that milestone early. In other cases, they might be more of an average or a median, in which case about half of kids will be early. Sometimes early milestones might signify interest more than ability. Other times they might be more about exposure.

But generally, if a child is meeting many milestones significantly early, that is a sign of giftedness. Of course, as loraxc said, not all gifted kids have early milestones, and not all kids with early milestones will end up being gifted.

There are also often more subtle clues in younger children (even infants) such as heightened awareness of people and surroundings (many people will say, "Wow! He's so alert!"). There is on specific formula to determine if a young child is gifted, but I'd be suspicious of it with a highly engaged, aware, and alert child who was meeting milestones early.

But, as said above, NOT doing those things also does not rule it out. It's really very individual, and at a young age can be tricky to tell.

I read in a scientific article (sorry, no citation as it's not in English) about identifying giftedness at pre-school age (as in before grade school, not specifically from 3 y onwards) that the one consistent indicator for giftedness they have found is extremely early verbal development (e.g. full sentences, correct pronouns and past tense before age two). Meaning that if this verbal development is present, chances are high that the child will turn out gifted, if it's not, chances are lower, but it does not rule giftedness out.)

DD (working 2 years ahead of age in school) was a terrible talker (actually, all my DC are very late talkers by most milestone charts). Certainly no sentences before 2yo (could choke on my cuppa tea thinking about the possiblity; DC4 is almost 21 months and can barely manage 3 words; I'm pretty sure that kid's as thick as 6 barn doors, though -- loveable, but not quick off the mark, at present).

There IS such a thing as late developers. My dad graduated top of his law school class and went onto become a judge; he wasn't even speaking English properly when he started school, and he nearly had to repeat 2nd grade he was so slow to learn to read (and yes, he was raised in an English-only speaking household!).

~ Yank Transplant to Britain and Zookeeper of 4 DC age 15 and under. ~

Now, I don't know enough to know if this is an exception to the rule - but it certainly illustrates that meeting milestones early is no guarantee of future giftedness. I have a six-year-old niece. She walked early (about 8 months) and did a handfull of other things early too. She had an exceptionally long attention span - it was very unusual. At around 18 months she learned all the letters and numbers up to 10 using an electronic game that she would play with for an hour at a time. Flash forward four years... she has profound developmental delays. She's extremely delayed in speech (most people can't understand her, and she has a really hard time understanding people); she's also very delayed in fine motor skills and cognitive development. She was delayed to begin kindergarten, and is in a special education classroom right now. Someone looking at her "strengths" as a baby would think that perhaps she was on the track to being quite gifted. (But - a close observer would have also noted a lot of things that weren't "quite right" - like not smiling, not understanding simple instructions, not communicating nonverbally, etc.)

If a child is globally ahead - then, I'd stack the odds in favor of that child being bright and perhaps gifted. If a child is just ahead in a few areas (even remarkably so) I don't think it necessarily means anything.

Thank you for all your posts. Please keep them coming. I really loving reading about all your experiences. I am a kindergarten teacher and have seen so many children. Often parenst would be all excited to tell me that their five year old is reading and they thought their kid was advanced. In most cases I would think to myself "Sometimes it only means they are reading early...doesn't mean they are advanced." Now I am a mom and am watching my 10 month old start to walk. I watch so many kids his age now do different things and just wonder what it all means for them as learners and doers in the future. My 2 cousins each have girls. One walked at 10 months and the other just started to crawl at 11 months. I am curious to see if it means anything.
Thanks !!!!

I THINK (and I could have this wrong) that there is research to show that the correlation between physical milestones and giftedness is fairly weak. Sometimes there does seem to be a relationship, but many gifted kids areaverage or even behind on physical milestones. In my anecdotal experience, though, I have noticed that kids who walk very early (like 8-9 months) have a way of turning out to be very bright. (My own DC did not do this.)

Nothing definitive about whether my son (3 yo) is gifted or not, but I will say that he didn't walk until 16 months, but was speaking in clear sentences by age 2. Most kids aren't early with ALL milestones--most of the time the children seem to concentrate on one area of development at a time. I believe researchers have found some correlation between early physical development as a child and athletic ability, but I don't think walking at 10 months would qualify as particularly early.

Often parenst would be all excited to tell me that their five year old is reading and they thought their kid was advanced. In most cases I would think to myself "Sometimes it only means they are reading early...doesn't mean they are advanced."

Reading early *is* advanced. At a minimum, if a child has the phonetic and/or sight word ability to be reading by 5 years old, they are advanced, IMO. I wouldn't be quick to dismiss this ability. If nothing else, it should be nurtured. There is nothing more frustrating to a child who can read (aka being able to crack the code,) to have to endure lessons on phonetics and wait for the rest of the class to catch up.

ETA: Advanced doesn't always mean gifted, of course, but I think it's always important to recognize the skill level. Allowing a child to work up to their individual ability is a wonderful thing. Hearing a child say, "I know what I want to do, but I can't do it. I have to wait," is depressing.

Laura - Mom to ds (10) and dd (7) "Time stands still best in moments that look suspiciously like ordinary life." Brian Andreas.

One is now a fluent reader & very artistic at 4, but talked late. One DD was very verbal from the start and is learning to read, she has amazing language skills and problem solving skills. They walked at 14 & 18 months (one DD has gross motor delays).

They both had early delays and were in Early Intervention-- it is amazing how far they have come. Neither has ever hit physical milestones early (usually late) but in other areas they have hit them early/on time.

I think it is important to note that ALL kids usually vary on strengths/weaknesses. I doubt many children hit all milestones *exactly* on time (without some being early/late etc). Development at those ages is often unbalanced---physical skills will increase, THEN verbal or vice versa. A toddler often will focus on a skill group and then once they master it, move one to a different one.

I think a wonderful list of gifted toddler/preschool traits can be seen here:Preschool gifted traits. Note: gifted preschoolers may not display all of the characteristics, just a note of many of them would warrant further investigation.

I THINK (and I could have this wrong) that there is research to show that the correlation between physical milestones and giftedness is fairly weak. Sometimes there does seem to be a relationship, but many gifted kids areaverage or even behind on physical milestones. In my anecdotal experience, though, I have noticed that kids who walk very early (like 8-9 months) have a way of turning out to be very bright. (My own DC did not do this.)

I've read that walking is a fairly meaningless milestone in terms of getting an overall developmental picture. I've read that in multiple places, and could try to dig up the original research when I have more time. Like all things, I am sure there is some controversy and disagreement with this.

Anyone else heard the old wives tale "Late walker, early talker"? This has been very true in my (very limited) experience. And, yeah, even if this old wives tale has some truth there will always be exceptions.

To the OP -

I only recently started coming to this forum as I was beginning to suspect that DS could be gifted. He's only 14 months, though, so it is way too early to tell. He didn't start walking until after he turned one. By 14 months, though, he was started to use simple two word statements and knew all his letters and numbers and a list of other surprising (to me) and seemingly advanced 'achievements'. DH and I were both labeled gifted as children. Honestly, I would love it if DS is bright but I am a bit more nervous about him being truly gifted. My experience as a gifted child was frustrating and the schools never knew what to do with me. It was also sort of lonely. I am hopeful that times have changed... but based on some experiences I have read here, I think many highly gifted children continue to struggle to get their needs met by most public school systems.

I think you'll enjoy this forum and learning for other BTDT mamas. I've learned a lot in my short time here. It's an extremely supportive environment to talk openly about where your kiddo is at without having to worry about people thinking you are bragging/lying/exaggerating.

I'd love to hear more about your baby! What other signs are you seeing other than walking? Does your dc have a lot of words? Creative problem solving? Were you or your husband identified as gifted as children?

I just have to point out, if a child walks just after 1yo then they are an entirely AVERAGE age for first independent walking, whereas if they speak in 2+ word phrases at 14m they are talking relatively early.

So that would be an example of 'Average walking, early talking'.

Have to be at least 16-18 months before the child should be labeled 'late walking'.

Whereas, my DC mostly walked by 10 months and didn't manage 2 word phrases until after their 2nd birthday (and not very intelligibly, generally, until past their 3rd birthday, either). My DC are good examples of 'Early walking late talking'.

I didn't realise that OP meant movement milestones, I assumed they meant stuff like speech, knowing colours and mastering a shape-sorter or peg puzzles. I don't understand why anyone associates movement milestones with future brains. I know a lot of brainy people who were late walkers.

~ Yank Transplant to Britain and Zookeeper of 4 DC age 15 and under. ~

I just have to point out, if a child walks just after 1yo then they are an entirely AVERAGE age for first independent walking, whereas if they speak in 2+ word phrases at 14m they are talking relatively early.

So that would be an example of 'Average walking, early talking'.

Have to be at least 16-18 months before the child should be labeled 'late walking'.

Whereas, my DC mostly walked by 10 months and didn't manage 2 word phrases until after their 2nd birthday (and not very intelligibly, generally, until past their 3rd birthday, either). My DC are good examples of 'Early walking late talking'.

I didn't realise that OP meant movement milestones, I assumed they meant stuff like speech, knowing colours and mastering a shape-sorter or peg puzzles. I don't understand why anyone associates movement milestones with future brains. I know a lot of brainy people who were late walkers.

Wow! If that's really the current standard, then I've never met or heard of a true late walker. And about 90% of babies I know, or have heard of, are early walkers. How could my personal data set be so skewed? I, DH, my mom and dad, grandma, brother etc. (basically everyone in my family and DHs family, immediate and other wise) walked at or before 10 1/2 months. So, I guess that is why started to walk just after a year seemed late to us.

My oldest dd walked at 13 months and was speaking 2-3 sentences clearly before 18 months. BUT she was also almost a month early so her peditrician said not to worry if she fell behind a month. I think most of her milestones were right "on time".

My little dd is almost a year old and is on the verge of walking right now, speaks about 12-15 words and understands when you talk to her (and obeys some stuff - like when I tell her to sit in her highchair). I can't remember oldest dd's comprehension at this age.

I do remember that at infancy both girls were (are) very alert, verbal (during the gibberish stage), active and in need of engagment. And nosey too....both had to know what was going on at all times!!

Now, I don't know enough to know if this is an exception to the rule - but it certainly illustrates that meeting milestones early is no guarantee of future giftedness. I have a six-year-old niece. She walked early (about 8 months) and did a handfull of other things early too. She had an exceptionally long attention span - it was very unusual. At around 18 months she learned all the letters and numbers up to 10 using an electronic game that she would play with for an hour at a time. Flash forward four years... she has profound developmental delays. She's extremely delayed in speech (most people can't understand her, and she has a really hard time understanding people); she's also very delayed in fine motor skills and cognitive development. She was delayed to begin kindergarten, and is in a special education classroom right now. Someone looking at her "strengths" as a baby would think that perhaps she was on the track to being quite gifted. (But - a close observer would have also noted a lot of things that weren't "quite right" - like not smiling, not understanding simple instructions, not communicating nonverbally, etc.)

I have a nine-year-old niece with autism. She hit every single one of her milestones from birth to age three late enough to qualify for Early Intervention, and was involved with that program from the age of eight months (when she couldn't sit up independently) until she aged out of that system at three and was moved up to the IU. She went to a "developmental preschool" from three to five, and then there was a ton of testing and a big conference about getting her ready for kindergarten. At 13 months, BizzyBug's physical therapy was discontinued because she started pulling up to standing and cruising on her own; She was walking shortly thereafter. BizzyBug didn't speak until she was around three, and initially it was all echolalia (you'd say "What's your name?" and she'd say "What's your name?" with the same exact cadences you'd just used). She played "strangely" with her toys, sometimes holding a car upside-down and spinning a wheel for ages, or stacking everything blue in one corner and everything white in another. Eye contact was (still is!) difficult to impossible; For the first four years of her life, she only made eye contact accidentally.

That said, we're pretty sure that she learned to read before she learned to talk, because by the time she was talking she was reading very well. She read in a flat, monotonous voice and she had almost no comprehension, but she most assuredly read. Her IQ puts her in the low 140s, and she's definitely gifted. She's also just as certainly autistic. The correlation is so strong that when Bean completed his kindergarten curriculum in two and a half months, Chibi (Bizzy's older sister) asked if he was "like BizzyBug"-- she wanted to know if he was autistic, too. In fact, Chibi asked me that again last night, in reference to another child she knows who is also on the spectrum and who is also highly gifted. Her exact words were, "Are you sure that Bean doesn't have that weird brain thing going on?" (As an aside, it's fascinating to me that so many associate ASD with a lack of intellectual ability while Chibi and her classmates have come to associate it with just the opposite-- kids who are absolutely brilliant. It's not just Bizzy, Chibi has met several other children who fit this profile, enough that she used to say, "When I'm eight, I'm going to be autistic!"

I guess what I'm saying is, some kids take even asynchrony to whole new levels. It's still quite possible that your niece is intellectually gifted, and that her brain is just organized very, very atypically.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MyZymurgy

Wow! If that's really the current standard, then I've never met or heard of a true late walker. And about 90% of babies I know, or have heard of, are early walkers.

As with most other things, there's a range. I think that the range of average for walking is from 12 to 14 months, with 11 and 15 months being quite common, 10/16 being less common, and 9/17 months being early/late. (Did that make sense?) My Bella didn't walk until she was at least 15 months old, and wasn't stable until closer to 16 months; That was considered the outside range of normal. Boobah walked before nine months, and she was definitely early (though I think people made a big deal out of it because she was so freaking *tiny*, as she had scarcely outgrown her 0-3 month sized clothing ).

I have definitely experienced the idea (from PP) that hitting physical milestones early is not greatly relevant to giftedness.

I have had an interesting little (non-scientific) experiment to watch.

DS has a friend that is his exact same age. Friend was bigger than DS the first 12 months, Friend sat up, crawled, walked and ran noticeably earlier. For walking: Friend walked independently at 10 months, DS was a little past 14 months.

By 2 Friend was faster and much more adventurous, more of a climber, balancer, etc.

On the other side of this: DS was speaking over 100 words at 15 months while Friend was speaking next to none. DS was starting 2-3 word sentences by 18 months, Friend had a handful of words (none of which I could understand). Around 2, DS was up to 12+ word sentences with past tense "if, then" statements, etc. while Friend was just starting to put 2 simple words together. So a conversation between them was like this : DS: "After we play with the balls let's go cook in the kitchen" and the Friend (if he said anything): "go kishen".

While I do believe DS to be somewhere on the gifted spectum (for more reasons than outlined above), and Friend not as liekly to be, I want to point out how very physically gifted I think Friend to be. I believe in Multiple Intelligences, and think Friend could be a super gifted athlete some day while DS might be a prominent speaker/leader/professor (or whatever). Know what I mean?

So be careful looking for your child to be gifted in the "academic" sense just because he's physically gifted.

Of course, he could be both or neither. 10 months is awfully young to pick up on this kind of thing.

I believe in Multiple Intelligences, and think Friend could be a super gifted athlete some day while DS might be a prominent speaker/leader/professor (or whatever). Know what I mean?

I wouldn't be so quick to think his friend isn't gifted. It's awfully early. There have been many later talkers on this forum (not my kids, btw). I am firmly convinced that while early and complex language is a pretty strong indictaor of giftedness, its LACK does not indicate a LACK of giftedness.

Also...among my DD's peers, even at 6, I see children whom I yet believe are going to bloom into something amazing. They may not have traditional early milestones, but there is something about them...

I wouldn't be so quick to think his friend isn't gifted. It's awfully early. There have been many later talkers on this forum (not my kids, btw). I am firmly convinced that while early and complex language is a pretty strong indictaor of giftedness, its LACK does not indicate a LACK of giftedness.

Yup. Dd1 didn't talk at all until 2.5. By 3 she was speaking quite well. She didn't read early either, started just before she turned 6, after 3 months she is reading at 2nd grade level. However, at 5 years old she could complete 500 piece puzzles in less than 4 hours. She has tested HG.

I wouldn't be so quick to think his friend isn't gifted. It's awfully early. There have been many later talkers on this forum (not my kids, btw). I am firmly convinced that while early and complex language is a pretty strong indictaor of giftedness, its LACK does not indicate a LACK of giftedness.

My Bella didn't talk all that much until she was closer to three than not. Now she's five months from turning four and she's reading. She's also reasoning in ways that make it very clear that she's very, very, very bright. We've said it before and we'll say it again; While you can often tell that a two year old *is* gifted, you certainly can't tell if they're *not*. At two I was pretty sure Bella was quite average; These days I'm eating my words.

I wasn't necessarily only talking about physical milestones when I first posted this question. I just used my cousins' children as an example of how all children are so different and hit milestones at different times. I appreciates all the posts. I think it is an interesting topic of conversation and there definitely doesn't seem to be a clear cut answer. Keep the stories coming

I read in a scientific article (sorry, no citation as it's not in English) about identifying giftedness at pre-school age (as in before grade school, not specifically from 3 y onwards) that the one consistent indicator for giftedness they have found is extremely early verbal development (e.g. full sentences, correct pronouns and past tense before age two). Meaning that if this verbal development is present, chances are high that the child will turn out gifted, if it's not, chances are lower, but it does not rule giftedness out.)

Well, I don't know about in general, but that correlates with my family's experience.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MyZymurgy

Anyone else heard the old wives tale "Late walker, early talker"? This has been very true in my (very limited) experience. And, yeah, even if this old wives tale has some truth there will always be exceptions.

My first son walked at 12 months, but he was climbing vertically (like ladders and play structures and high chairs, etc) before he was walking. He spoke his first words at 3 months. By 4 months he had "hi" "mama" "numnum" and something else I can't remember. My second son had pretty much the same time table for learning to talk, same age, mostly the same words, but he was walking at 9 months. My daughter started saying a few words at 5 months, and she is 9 months and on the verge of walking.

I really don't trust preschool and kindergarten milestones for showing giftedness, though. I think it depends on the child's personality.

Example: my mom and dad are both profoundly gifted. My mother taught herself to read when she was 3 and looked like what you might expect from a gifted preschooler-- very interested in academics. My dad has an IQ of 180, but he learned to read in kindergarten, not before. He would not have stood out as profoundly gifted before he was tested.

♥ blogger astrologer mom to three cool kiddos, and trying to figure out this divorce thing-- Blossom and Glow ♥

My dad has an IQ of 180, but he learned to read in kindergarten, not before. He would not have stood out as profoundly gifted before he was tested.

I have to wonder about this. My son also learned to read in kindergarten, but while I didn't think of him as profoundly gifted then it's very clear to me in retrospect that it had more to do with my own misunderstandings about what profound giftedness entailed than with Bean's abilities. I had (probably still have ) an extremely warped perspective, and was one of those parents who looked at the PBS development tracker and thought "Well that can't possibly be accurate..." In my experience, most parents who learn that their children are profoundly gifted at five/six/seven and beyond look back and say "Oh yeah... well I guess that wasn't exactly typical." It's especially difficult for parents of children who don't exhibit the signs that we've been taught to expect. Most of us can agree that a child who teaches herself to read at two is profoundly gifted, but we might fail to recognize that a child who can accurately read a map and explain it to anyone who holds still long enough is likewise gifted if they can't read a book.

My ds hit a number of physical milestones early but at the time I had wondered if it was simply b/c he was so lean - he rolled over at 2 months for example but I know that his body type made it easier for him to do that.

He's now in kindergarten and is quite bright - don't know if he is technically "gifted" or not yet. (He is 1 - 1.5 grade levels up in terms of academic ability.) The other signs I've looked for, in addition to the developmental milestones, are ones that show that he is "getting" things, and to me this is more telling than the check-off lists I have found on various websites. For example, we actually never really had to put cleaners and other "keep out of children's reach" items locked up. Somehow our ds, even as a baby, knew to not touch them. Also, we were playing on a wide but quiet neighborhood street once when he was 2 and I noticed that he ran and then abruptly stopped to look both ways before he crossed. When he was 4 my husband and I were going through a rough patch, and during this time ds was not including his dad in any of his drawings. Frustrated by this, I found myself nagging at ds, "Where's daddy? Why didn't you draw daddy in this picture?" He saw right through me and instead of responding directly, simply got annoyed and said, "I love you both - I just ran out of space" and put his picture away, exasperated. It's these types of comments and actions that make me wonder if he sees the world in a more mature way than what would be "typical" of his age.

The other thing that is telling, I think, is intellectual curiosity. If they really get into something and keep at it because they can't get enough of it, then I think it's a good sign. There are kids who become very capable because of pressure and exposure, and then there are those who become capable through their own passions and persistence. In the long run this is what will keep them in school and allow them to keep building on their "smartness."

Anyway, I don't know if I have gone off your original topic and question but those are my thoughts on what's been useful for me in understanding ds' possible "giftedness."

What a great thread! This is my first time really looking in this forum.. I suspect DS could be "gifted" but he is only 15 mo so of course it is too early to tell. He has been early-ish for most milestones.. walked at 9 months, talked at 6 months.. has 20-ish words now, has a few 2 word sentences, about 5 signs that we have taught him... he has always been very alert, active, high-needs, curious... he gets into everything. He recently has began to love being read to, and has memorized parts of his books already. Both his father and I were labeled gifted in school, though never tested. So it is definitely a good possibility he is, or at least is bright.

Only time will tell, but he has been early for almost all milestones and seems smart to me, but of course I am his Mama.

Catie - Happy wife to Aaron (01.05), mama to Liam(08.08), and Ian (11.10)! and due Feb 2013 with blessing #3!